When Sonja and I were going through marriage prep classes at our church, one of our pastors walked our group through an exercise which proposed many different scenarios all ending with the question, “Still married?” For example, he said what if right after the wedding ceremony, you and your spouse get into a car accident which leaves your spouse unable to ever have kids….still married? Everyone answered YES for that one.

But the questions got progressively tougher. After asking about what happens when we grow older and our spouse doesn’t look quite as beautiful, strong, or fit as they once did (another seemingly easy one), he brought questions about abuse into the equation (many people started saying they might walk away from their spouse at that point). Then, he started to talk about situations of adultery and even asked whether we would remain married if that same adulterous spouse didn’t even want to stay with us (most people were shaking their heads no at this point).

The point of this exercise was to encourage us to not covenant before the LORD that we would love and stand by our spouse “until death do us part” if we didn’t really mean it. It was an extremely thought-provoking exercise, which we benefitted from greatly, as Sonja and I talked about marriage being so much greater than appearances, abilities, and our feelings.

But what would you do if you were in a relationship with someone who had an accident that dramatically changed what your life together might look like. That is part of Ian and Larissa’s story. They had made no commitments. There was a direction towards marriage, but no wedding ceremonies to that point, and yet they chose a path that Sonja and I found beautiful as we listened to their story. Watch and consider a love that thinks less about self and more about others.